Friday afternoon we rode the Shinkansen to the mountain resort town of Karuizawa. It is an hour and ten minutes on the train, but a world away from the concrete and tall buildings of Tokyo. The ryokan where we are staying is surrounded by trees, yet close to the quaint shopping street lined with vendors. We arrived in the dark on Friday and found our way to an Italian restaurant for dinner. We were greeted at the door by a friendly waiter displaying a laminated card written in English politely asking us to keep our child in their seat to avoid an accident with the hazardous hot plates carried by the servers. Hmm...there must have been an incident. After dinner we donned our yukatas and made our way to the hot bath. Roo and I slept on futons, Ryan and his dad on western beds. We woke this morning with a view from our window of a Japanese wedding in progress, first a kimono, next the white dress. We visited a lovely waterfall, walked the shopping street, ate a Japanese style dinner, and finished with the bath. Tomorrow we travel back to Tokyo to celebrate Roo's 5th birthday.
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